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Why are Coyotes bad?

JNRBRONC

JNRBRONC

Well-Known Member
Justify the shoot on site mentality, as I think I'm missing something here.....

Coyotes usually can't take down a healthy deer. While hunting the other night, I saw a group of does aggresively approach and drive off a coyote. Coyotes might nab a fawn here and there, but nothing of significance. Fawns are essentially scentless for a period after being born, so it is hard for coyotes to find them. Coyotes clean up gut piles and prey on wounded deer. They have a role in the predator/prey balance. They are our only remaining predator (short of the few rogue mountain lions and the return of the bobcat).

Are the old misconceptions about predators still persuasive (only good ones are dead ones)? Not looking for a flame war here, just some healthy discussion. Can't we share the woods with these natural predators? And no, I'm NOT a tree hugger, I have many dead deer who could attest to that if they could.
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Most arguements I have seen have been based on the fact that the coyote is taking game the hunter is "entitled" to. Can't we allow a little competition?

Discuss why we should shoot coyotes, because I have been letting them walk.

Randy
 
I think coyotes are awesome. Love hearing them light up at night. They take a more heat than they deserve as far as being destructive to game populations. I always thought that tale ranks right there with the turkeys picking the crop seed out of the ground.
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I always thought that tale ranks right there with the turkeys picking the crop seed out of the ground.
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I have never heard that one. I know for a fact geese will pick crop seed out of the ground. We planted a small corn food plot twice along a river.They ate every single seed. We didn't get a single plant to grow. It was like yelling free beer at a stockcar race.
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As for coyotes I have found alot of piles of pheasant feathers out shed hunting with coyote tracks around them.
 
Yotes have a place in the timber, that's for sure. When I was a kid I could go out and shoot rabbits and quail also. Blame habitat loss or what ever you want, but nothing has really changed with the habitat that I used to hunt.

They are not being hunted much in my area, maybe a coincidental shooting here and there. You should hear the songdogs around here in the Summer. They are the ultimate survival machine if you ask me.

Fox, coons, coyotes, oppossums, bobcats, hawks, and wild cats have made small game hunting in my area a thing of the past.

As perfect as mother nature is, the balance still lies in our hands. There needs to be a bunch of yotes shot in my "neck of the woods".

The decline of the fur industry has paid it's price on small game.

On a side note.....while in my stand this Fall, I truely enjoyed watching a big blonde coyote catch field mice in a CRP field.
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I was going to say the same thing Danno. It is one thing if they kill the sheep/lambs and would eat them but before my dad got his Great Pyranese (SP?) sheep dog the yote's would kill the sheep and just let them lay. If she was producing milk they would kill them and just eat the udders off. But most of the time they just killed them and never came back. Don't think dad has lost any since getting the BIG sheep dog. On a side note, the Great Pyranese is a big furry white dog that is bred to protest livestock. It
is kind of interesting cuz it has extra dewclaws on it's back legs for after catching the 'yote it rips open it's belly with it's back legs to kill it. This dog actually eats the one's it catches!
 
I hunt yotes. I don't hunt them because they need to die. I think there awesome. If you ever get a chance to call in a coyote, Do it!!!! its awesome. They are the ultimate challenge. especially around here. shot 2 out of the four called in with 3 other spotted. They are frustrating though. They are pretty amazing.
 
Personally I'll shoot every one I see and not lose any sleep over them. Iowa was fine without them 35 years ago and so were the pheasants, quail and rabbits. I don't think that habitat shortages is the reason we don't have the small game animals we used to because less people hunt them now. I have had yotes screw my bowhunting up enough to not miss them if they weren't here, kind of like those barking squirrels at just the wrong time.
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Quote: Discuss why we should shoot coyotes, because I have been letting them walk.


They are probably at their highest price per pelt in the last 15 years. I'm getting an average of $15 per hide. Besides we as humans are the ULTIMATE predators. Plus it keeps me in good with most every farmer whose ground I kill them on......Hog, cattle and sheep farmers hate them.

Pupster
 
I'm sure I'll be overlapping other's thoughts here, but coyotes need to be managed just like most other game we have in this country. Yotes may be our only predator in a lot of areas, but what are yotes prey of?? Nothing that I can think of. They are considered varmints for a reason and need to be shot accordingly. I fully agree that if they were shot out completely, our country side would be over run with mice and other unwanted creatures. But as I see it, coyotes in general are harder to hunt than most deer out there. They are very smart animals and unless they are mostly unpressured...they are hard to kill. You have to look far beyond what they do to a deer population. Rabbits, grouse, turkeys, pheasants, quail, ducks, etc.. Even though I disagree with you on what they can do to a small group of deer. Ever see an area with a good 8" of hard pack snow where the deer are too heavy to run on the top but yotes just glide on the surface??? And then to see a pack of yotes take down a deer or two because they can?? Your views may change a tad bit if you saw it. Granted, that scenario doesn't play out a lot but it does happen. You just may not encounter it in Iowa with the lack of snow you guys get.
 
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You guys have never raised sheep, have you?

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Yep, did have sheep for awhile. I ran Texas LongHorns with them and didn't have a problem with the tons of yotes in the area.
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as far as the turkeys eating seed....it happens, i've seen it.

a dork i work with saw 4 yotes trying to take down a 400-700 pound steer. he killed one with his shotgun, and rolled 2 others. coyotes are predators, everyone you kill, could mean another few nests of birds, another dozen rabbits, or a farmers newborn calf that gets a fighting chance. sure, there may be plenty of birds in your area, but wouldn't you like a few more? deer need hunted to keep their populations in check, coyotes need hunted for the same reasons.
 
Here in southern Illinois at my house the coyotes have taken alot of our quail and rabbits. me and my friends from school go out bout every other day when the ground is frozen and hunt them. I personaly don't like them. and it is a blast to hunt um.
 
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deer need hunted to keep their populations in check, coyotes need hunted for the same reasons.

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This is exactly right. Not only that they are fun and challenging to hunt. I will shoot one any chance I get though just for the simple fact that it may save an extra turkey or pheasant nest.
 
I agree with what most are sayig, a few yotes no big deal, but it seems like in many areas they are very very over populated. We don't hunt them directly on our farm in IL, but are going to start this year. I finally saw 1 nice covey of quail this year on our farm (about 30) which was shocking since I hadn't seen them in almost 7 years. When we first got the farm you could shoot quail all day long, we had many large covies and also plenty of pheasants. Since the yotes have gotten overpopulated I haven't seen or heard a pheasant and besides the one covie of quail not another bird.

Also, the farmers that I hunt in IA run cattle, and they tell me to shoot everyone I see due to the fact that they loose a calf annually to them, no this is just mother nature I know, but if the yotes weren't so overpopulated it probably would not happen.

Finally, I have had one ruin a nice buck coming in my way 4 years ago. Damn buck just stopped in his tracks then ran off after about a 30 second stare down.
 
I don't see them as bad, except in areas where there is an excess of the animals. With that being said, I will try to shoot everyone I see. For the most part, I think they clean up the weak and sick prey. They are a very smart animal and a true trophy, expecially with a bow, imo. As for the turkey tale, well last spring when we planted corn the turkeys came into the field and began walking right down the rows and eating the corn before the planter was out of the field. They did that same thing everyday for 2-3 days until we finally got some rain and the soil sealed over. When I killed my bird I opened his stomach and it was full of seed with a purple ink on the germ.

Wait and see what kind of damage these bobcats start doing if a season isn't implemented.
 
I know for a fact where I hunt that the yotes are way overpopulated. When I was bow hunting I had a pack of 6-8..(still kind of dark) run out in front of me across a picked bean field. Also we gut shot a doe this gun season and we knew by the way she was running she would be dead by morning and let her go for the night....the next day she was 1/2 gone. When you go outside at night you can usually hear 2-3 groups coming from different areas.
I used to think that coyotes were ok but now they need to be thinned down to contol overpopulation and to help out other areas of wildlife.
 
There is an interesting article in this month's NRA American Hunter Magazine that discusses this. If I remember right it also says something along the lines that coyotes were kept in check east of the Mississippi before the removal of all the wolves. Now coyotes are everywhere.
 
I’m with silvertip on this one as well as far not seeing them as bad. I will say however that in my neck of the woods they are getting to be a lot around. Five years ago they were around. You would hear them at dusk. Now I am sure that due to them not be hunted or pursued that they have doubled in population around me. It will be nothing to see one along the timber edge or crossing a field in broad daylight around my place on a regular basis. I see them often while on the bow stand as well. In ten years I have shot three with the bow, one with a pistol and several with the high power but I had to work at it. Calling them at night with a high power is not as easy as it seems. It’s really no different than hunting any other kind of animal legally. There is a reason there is a season and that is to help keep the population in check. Why do you think the season is continuous open. The problem is that not as many people hunt them as before. I know for a fact that there is know way I can keep the population in check with the few I take a year.
 
Regarding the turkeys eating the corn planted in rows...

I believe I may have seen this happen one time myself. A few years ago I spotted a lone turkey out in a freshly planted field, it was a solid 300 yards from the nearest timber and was walking along pecking about every foot or two. I was a distance away myself, watching it with binoculars, but it sure looked like it could have been scouring up some of the freshly planted seed. It could also have been pecking away at grubs, other seeds, etc. I couldn't say for sure from where I was either way.

At any rate, when I mentioned this to the farmer he stated right away that he was convinced the turkeys commonly ate the newly planted seeds. Go figure.
 
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